Warm thoughts for a cold day

Despite the increasing desperation of the nanny-nanny naysayers who try to equate lack of perfect knowledge with no knowledge and scenarios using different assumptions with wild guesses, the evidence for global climate change just keeps mounting.

Buenos Aires, Argentina (December 16, AP) - The year 2004, punctuated by four powerful hurricanes in the Caribbean and deadly typhoons lashing Asia, was the fourth-hottest on record, extending a trend since 1990 that has registered the 10 warmest years, a U.N. weather agency said Wednesday.

The current year was also the most expensive for the insurance industry in coping worldwide with hurricanes, typhoons and other weather-related natural disasters, according to new figures released by U.N. environmental officials.

Not only have the 10 warmest years on record occurred in the last 14, the four warmest have come in the past six. Bear in mind that one of the central predictions of global climate change is that the increase in the average temperature of the globe will cause a disruption of climate patterns that will result in an increase in extreme weather - not just heat, but cold.

During the summer, heat waves in southern Europe pushed temperatures to near-record highs in southern Spain, Portugal and Romania, where thermostats peaked at 104 degrees while the rest of Europe sweltered through above-average temperatures. ...

Other parts of the world also witnessed extreme weather, with droughts occurring in the western United States, parts of Africa, Afghanistan, Australia and India. Jarraud, of the U.N. weather agency, said the droughts were part of what appears to be a surge over the last decade.

The prolonged rising temperatures and deadly storms were matched by harsh winters in other regions.

Peru, Chile, and southern Argentina were all hit with severe cold and snow during June and July.

The deniers have gradually been forced back by reality: First they claimed there was no such thing as global warming (or, more exactly, since they couldn't deny periods of natural warming and cooling in the past, that it was not happening now). Then they admitted that yes, the climate is changing but there's no evidence people had anything to do with it. Now, the argument is more along the lines of we don't know how much of the warming is produced by human activity. Or, alternately, we don't know exactly what the effects of a given level of warming will be. And in each case the tag line is "So there's nothing we need to do about it (except maybe study it more... and more... and more...)."

(A wonderful example of that last line of argument came just the other day from Paula Dobriansky, under secretary of state for global affairs and the leader of the American delegation to the UN conference on climate change which just wrapped up in Buenos Aires. She told the conference "Science tells us that we cannot say with any certainty what constitutes a dangerous level of warming, and therefore what level must be avoided." So since we don't know, we don't have to do anything until we do. Of course, then it will be too late, but dammit, at least we'll know for sure that we're screwed!)

The strength of the opponents of reality does not lie in their science - get this straight and clearly: There is a scientific consensus that global warming is real and present, over the last 50 years is mostly due to human activity, and presents significant risks over the next several decades. Period. - but in the power of the vested interests that support them. One of those villains (I use the term deliberately) is the fossil fuel industry, which stands to take a significant hit on its profits if the world starts turning away from their polluting products. Obviously connected to that are political forces in thrall to the corporate benevolence of those corporations.

Another set of villains, also linked but not quite so obvious, are the nations that produce oil.

Buenos Aires, December 10 (IPS) - The OPEC countries appear to be more concerned about the impact on their economies of measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions than about the potentially disastrous consequences of global warming for the nations of the developing South. ...

The oil-producing countries are demanding financial support to compensate for the loss of income that will supposedly result from measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, which are largely attributable to the burning of fossil fuels, according to scientists.

"Nobody wants to give a penny to Saudi Arabia, and Saudi Arabia isn't asking for it, either, but they're using these arguments to complicate the negotiations on an agreement," said Raúl Estrada Oyuela, head of the Argentine delegation.

Cute. It's the same sort of game the US is playing - obstruction by distraction - and to serve the same interests: the benefit of those who get rich off fossil fuels. Consider it the ideological companion to NIMBY: SLAIDAM (pronounced slay-dem, as in "kill other people"), or So Long As It Doesn't Affect Me.

Gee, I guess in this case the US isn't standing alone against the world, is it? And what a lovely cause for internationalism, too.

Footnote: If you're interested in keeping up with the science of climate change and the political issues surrounding it, check out Real Climate, self-described as "a commentary site on climate science by working climate scientists for the interested public and journalists." Fair warning: It does get into the actual science involved, although not on a highly technical level. Personally, what I find most interesting is the skeptics who post comments that more or less rely on cherry-picking data to support their case. That's what they're down to.

The scientific debate is over. It's the political and PR debate that we see.